On March 22nd,
the Supreme Court made history by considering the depth and breadth of the
“free appropriate public education” (FAPE) mandate in the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) for all students with disabilities (SWD).

In their unanimous
decision (Endrew F. v. Douglas County School District, 2017; CLICK HERE
for the entire official decision], the Supreme Court expanded the scope of
SWD’s special education rights—building on their decision 35 years earlier
in Board of Education of Hendrick Hudson Central School District,
Westchester County v. Rowley (1982).

When taken together, the Rowley
decision provides districts and schools FAPE-related guidance for SWDs who are
educated in the regular education classroom.The Endrew F. decision provides FAPE-related guidance when SWDs
need their educational programs largely outside of the regular education
classroom—typically in a special education classroom or setting.

According to an April 4thEducation
Week article by Christina Samuels and Mark Walsh [CLICK
HERE for the entire article], some of the “Key Takeaways” from the Endrew
F. decision are the following:

The court rejected a (FAPE) standard
adopted by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit that an IEP is
adequate as long as it provides a benefit that is “merely more than de
minimis.” Roberts said a student offered an IEP under that standard “can hardly
be said to have been offered an education at all.” He also noted that the IDEA
requires an educational program (that is) “reasonably calculated to enable a
child to make progress appropriate in light of the child’s circumstances,”
Roberts said.

More specifically:For a child fully integrated into the regular classroom, an IEP
typically should be “reasonably calculated to enable the child to achieve
passing marks and advance from grade to grade.”

For a child not fully integrated into
the regular classroom and for whom grade-level advancement is not a reasonable
prospect, an IEP must
be “appropriately ambitious,” providing the child the chance to “meet
challenging objectives,” the court said.

The opinion rejected an argument put
forth on behalf of Endrew F. that would require schools to provide students
with disabilities the opportunity “to achieve academic success, attain
self-sufficiency, and contribute to society that are substantially equal to the
opportunities afforded children without disabilities.” Roberts said such a
standard was at odds with the court’s analysis in Rowley.

Overall, the Supreme Court ruling recognized
the individual nature of SWDs’ educational needs.That is, given the 13 disabilities areas
covered within IDEA, different students will have different, and different intensities
of, service, support, instructional, and intervention needs.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Comparing & Contrasting Amy Rowley vs.
Endrew F.

The critical background
points relative to the Rowley case are the following:

* Amy Rowley
was a student whose disability involved having a hearing impairment.

* She was
making “excellent progress in school”— “perform[ing] better than the average
child in her (general education) class” and “advancing easily from grade to
grade.” Her IEP provided her with “time each week with a special tutor and
a speech therapist” and a “district propos(al) that Amy’s classroom teacher
speak into a wireless transmitter and that Amy use an FM hearing aid designed
to amplify her teacher’s words. . .”

* The 1982
Supreme Court only considered “the facts of (this) case before us,” and
concluded that the individualized educational program described above
“satisfied the FAPE requirement”—presumably, because Amy was making progress
given the services provided.

* More
specifically, the Court defined the provision of FAPE for students “receiving
instruction in the regular classroom. . . (T)his would generally require an IEP
‘reasonably calculated to enable the child to achieve passing marks and advance
from grade to grade.’”

*
Beyond this case, the Supreme Court did not provide a “test” (or a series
of decision rules) that could be used in future cases to determine the presence
of FAPE.

In fact, as
noted above, the Court acknowledged that IDEA requires states to “educate a
wide spectrum of children with disabilities and that the benefits obtainable by
children at one end of the spectrum will differ dramatically from those
obtainable by children at the other end.”

_ _ _ _ _

The notable,
functional differences between Amy Rowley and Endrew F. include the following:

*
Endrew has a different disability than Amy—namely, autism, and the services
provided in his IEP were not addressing his significant social, emotional, and
behavioral needs such that he was not making progress in the regular classroom.

*
Endrew’s IEP was not changing over time—from the District’s perspective because
he was “failing to make meaningful progress toward his aims.”From the Parents’ perspective, Endrew’s lack
of progress indicated that “only a thorough overhaul of the school district’s
approach to Endrew’s behavioral problems could reverse th(is) trend.”

*
Endrew’s attendance at a “private school that specializes in educating children
with autism” resulted in behavioral improvements and “a degree of academic
progress”—based on IEPs that provided him “a behavioral intervention plan that
identified Endrew’s most problematic behaviors and set out particular
strategies for addressing them.”

In summary:
Endrew was different than Amy because (a) his disability was largely
behaviorally-related (an area not addressed in the Rowley decision); (b) he was
not making educational progress in the regular classroom (with the services and
supports in his IEP); and (c) he needed more specialized and intensive
interventions (in a substantially different special education placement and
program).

With the Endrew F. ruling in hand, districts
and schools need to review the research and practice of how they are providing
their multi-tiered continuum of services, supports, instruction, and intervention
for different students with different disabilities and different intensities of
need.

In order to do this, an evidence-based academic
instruction and intervention blueprint is briefly described in this Blog
message.Our next Blog will present an
evidence-based social, emotional, and behavioral instruction and intervention
blueprint.Using both blueprints,
schools and districts can evaluate their current multi-tiered continua, those
elements that they need to maintain, the gaps that exist, and what steps are
needed to close those gaps.

Critically, in order to provide an
appropriate, differentiated FAPE to all SWDs, schools and districts need these
blueprints to help guide their IDEA-related prevention, assessment, and
instruction/intervention processes.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

A Multi-Tiered Model for Students with Disabilities Who are Academically
Struggling

The Instructional Environment Context

Initially, it is essential that schools
recognize that effective, differentiated academic instruction and intervention
(for ALL students, but especially for SWDs) occurs in the context of three
interdependent domains in the classroom (and historically, for students, in prior
classrooms):

* The different academic curricula being
taught in a classroom, as well as their connection to state standards and
benchmarks, and district scope and sequence objectives (i.e., “What needs to
be learned?”);

* The teachers (as well as support staff and
interventionists) who are teaching these curricula, and how they organize and
execute their classroom instruction (i.e., “Are appropriate instructional
and management strategies being used?”); and

* The students who are engaged in
learning—and specifically their abilities and disabilities, their motivation to
learn, master, and apply instructional material; and their response to
effective instruction, sound curricula, instructional accommodations and
modifications, and targeted remediation and intervention (i.e., “Is each
student capable, prepared, motivated, and able to learn, and are they learning?”).

_
_ _ _ _

In a proactive, preventative sense, when all
three Instructional Environment domains are integrated, coordinated, and
working well together, all students (a) engage enthusiastically in the
classroom’s curriculum and instruction; (b) learn and master the academic
material presented; and (c) apply their learning to “real-world” and other
applications while, progressively, becoming independent and life-long learners.

However, when students (in general and with
disabilities) are not progressing (or “responding”) to what appears to be
effective, differentiated classroom instruction being taught by effective and
knowledgeable teachers, a systematic data-based, functional assessment,
problem solving process is needed.

Required as an embedded part of the
multi-tiered continuum, this process (a) analyzes the characteristics and
contributions of factors within the three Instructional Environment domains
relative to students’ academic successes and shortcomings; (b) identifies the
specific underlying reasons, in each area, that objectively explain why different
students are at-risk, underperforming, unsuccessful, unresponsive, or failing;
and (c) links the assessment outcomes with strategic or intensive instruction
or intervention approaches.

Significantly:

* Unlike the RtI and MTSS frameworks
advocated by the U.S. Department of Education (through its various national
Technical Assistance Centers), the data-based problem-solving process should
occur as soon as a teacher
or teaching-team identifies a student as not progressing (that is, in “Tier
I”).

That is, students should not have to wait until they have
“failed” in Tier I, and then “failed” in Tier II—in order to finally receive
the individualized and multidisciplinary case review, assessment, and
intervention approaches that they require. . . in Tier III.

_
_ _ _ _

* This requires that all of the schools
in a district use the same problem-solving process (although these may
be differentiated at the elementary versus secondary levels), and that all
staff are collaboratively trained in this process and their specific responsibilities
along its continuum.

_
_ _ _ _

* Finally: The data-based analyses across the three Instructional
Environment domains will likely identify three different patterns of factors
underlying different students’ academic struggles.While the patterns often overlap, these
typically require three different instructional or intervention
approaches.

These patterns involve students whose lack
of academic success is predominantly due to past or present:

* Curricular processes (Curricular Casualties);

* Teacher-Instructional processes (Instructional Casualties); or

* Student-specific processes (Student Process Casualties).

_
_ _ _ _

Critically—unless shown otherwise—most Curricular
and Instructional Casualty students CAN learn, they just HAVE NOT had the opportunity
to learn.Thus, we just have to deliver
the “right” instruction (and resolve the curricular and/or instructional
factors that have interfered with prior learning).

Meanwhile, Student Process casualties
MAY be able to learn, but the data-based analyses need to differentiate WHY
this has not occurred.For example, is
it due to biologically-based or disability-related factors, to learning and
skill mastery factors, to motivational or support factors, or a combination?

The important point here is
that—while academically struggling students will need direct academic
services, supports, and interventions regardless of the source of their
problems, future Curricular or Instructional casualty students will be prevented only through direct changes
in the factors in these domains that are weak or not functioning well.

Earlier Blogs have discussed a number of
issues related to this discussion:

CLICK HERE Rethinking School
Improvement and Success, Staff Development and Accountability, and Students'
Academic and Behavioral Proficiency (July, 2016)

CLICK
HERE The New ESEA/ESSA: Discontinuing the U.S.
Department of Education’s School Turn-Around, and Multi-tiered Academic (RtI)
and Behavioral (PBIS) System of Support (MTSS) Frameworks (March, 2016)

Returning to the Rowley and Endrew
F. cases, the most important component of FAPE involves how schools define
and provide “appropriate” educational opportunities to SWDs.

Given our research, practice, and field-testing
across the country, we have designed a practical and successful evidence-based academic
instruction-to-intervention model that organizes the services, supports,
strategies, and interventions needed by SWDs to best provide them with FAPE.

The Positive
Academic Supports and Services model (PASS) involves a continuum of
academically-focused instructional and intervention approaches that are
strategically aligned across the different intensity levels within a
multi-tiered system (see figure below).

The foundation to the PASS model (see the
top of the figure above) is effective and differentiated classroom instruction
where teachers used evidence-based curricular materials and approaches that are
matched to students’ learning styles and needs.The ultimate goal is for students to learn, master, and (eventually) be
able to independently apply the targeted academic content and skills.This is accomplished as teachers continuously
evaluate (or progress monitor) students’ short- and long-term progress.

For at-risk, underperforming, unsuccessful,
unresponsive, or failing students or Students with Disabilities, teachers use
the data-based, functional assessment, problem-solving process to determine the
root causes of the students’ difficulties—then linking the assessment results
with instructional and/or intervention approaches at the right level of
intensity.

Depending on the frequency, intensity,
duration, or severity of the student challenge, the problem-solving process
could be accomplished by an individual teacher, a grade-level of teachers
working together, or a multi-disciplinary collaborative team of teachers and
support staff.

_
_ _ _ _

Relative to the instructional or intervention
approaches, these are organized in a loose six-area continuum briefly described
below:

* Assistive
Supports involve specialized equipment, technologies, medical/physical
devices, and other resources that help students, especially those with
significant disabilities, to learn and function—for example, physically,
behaviorally, academically, and in all areas of communication.Assistive supports can be used anywhere along
the PASS continuum.

* Remediation
involves strategies that teach students specific, usually prerequisite, skills
to help them master broader curricular, scope and sequence, or benchmark
objectives.

* Accommodations
change conditions that support student learning—such as the classroom setting
or set-up, how and where instruction is presented, the length of instruction,
the length or timeframe for assignments, or how students are expected to
respond to questions or complete assignments.

Accommodations can range from the informal ones
implemented by a classroom teacher, to the formal accommodations required by
and specified on a 504 Plan (named for the federal statute that covers these
services).

Remediations, accommodations, and
modifications involve many different strategies that need to be matched to the
specific needs of a student.They are
typically are implemented in general education classrooms by general education
teachers, although the teachers may need to consult with other colleagues or
specialists to facilitate their effective implementation.

At times, remediation, accommodation, and
modification strategies may be implemented in “pull-out,” “pull-in,” or
co-taught instructional skill groups. This allows larger numbers of students with
the same needs to be helped simultaneously.

Consistent with multi-tiered approaches, if
target students do not respond to the strategically-chosen strategies in these
three areas, or if their needs are more significant or complex, one or more of
the next two PASS areas may be needed:

* Strategic
Interventions focus on changing students’ specific academic skills or
strategies, their motivation, or their ability to comprehend, apply, analyze,
synthesize, or evaluate academic content and material.Strategic Interventions are typically based
on multidisciplinary assessments, and they may be documented in a formal
Academic Intervention Plan or Individualized Education Plan (AIP or IEP,
respectively).

* Compensatory
Approaches help students to compensate for disabilities that cannot be
changed or overcome (e.g., being deaf, blind, or having physical or central
nervous system/neurological disabilities).Often combined with assistive supports, compensatory approaches help
students to accomplish learning outcomes, even though they cannot learn or
demonstrate specific skills within those outcomes.

For example, for
students who will never learn to decode sounds and words due to neurological
dysfunctions (e.g., dyslexic students), the compensatory use of audio or
web-based instruction and (electronic) books can still help them to access
information from text and become knowledgeable and literate.Both assistive supports and compensatory approaches
are “positive academic supports” that typically are provided through IEPs.

_ _ _ _ _

Practical Points.While there is a sequential nature to the
components in the PASS continuum, it is a strategic and fluid—not a
lock-step—blueprint.That is, the
supports and services are utilized based on students’ needs, as well as the
intensity of those needs.

For example, if reliable and valid
assessments indicate that a student needs immediate accommodations to be
successful in the classroom, then there is no need to implement remediations or
modifications to “validate” that conclusion.

Moreover, many students with complex needs
will receive different supports or services on the PASS continuum
simultaneously.For example, some
students will need both modifications and assistive supports in order to be
successful.

Thus, consistent with the Rowley and Endrew
F. decisions, all PASS services, supports, strategies, and programs are
strategically delivered to individual students with individually assessed needs.And while it is most advantageous to deliver
needed supports and services within the general education classroom (i.e., the
least restrictive environment), other instructional options could include
co-teaching (e.g., by general and special education teachers in a general
education classroom), pull-in services (e.g., by instructional support or
special education teachers in a general education classroom), short-term
pull-out services (e.g., by instructional support teachers focusing on specific
academic skills and outcomes), or more intensive pull-out services (e.g., by
instructional support or special education teachers).

With a conscious eye to FAPE, these staff
and setting decisions are based on the intensity of students’ skill-specific
needs, their response to previous instructional or intervention services and
supports, and the level of instructional or intervention expertise needed.

Summary

Ultimately, the goal of the multi-tiered
PASS model is to provide students with early, intensive, and successful services
and supports that are identified through the problem-solving process, and
implemented with integrity and needed intensity.For the more strategic and intensive
strategies and interventions in the model, the assessment to intervention link,
and thus, the selection and implementation of the correct approaches along the
continuum help to ensure FAPE.

As an expansion of Rowley, the Endrew
F. decision helps us understand some basic principles relative to the
delivery of FAPE to SWDs:

1. The Supreme Court stated, “The goals may
differ, but every child should have the chance to meet challenging
objectives. Of course, this describes a general standard, not a for­mula.
But whatever else can be said about it,
this stand­ard is markedly more demanding than the “merely more than de
minimis” test applied by the Tenth Circuit.”

_
_ _ _ _

2. FAPE must be determined in the context of how a student’s disability impacts
the services and supports needed in an IEP (“in light of a child’s circumstances”).

_
_ _ _ _

3. SWDs are not guaranteed to make educational progress.

_
_ _ _ _

4. Having considered only two cases, involving two different disabilities (of
the 13 specified in IDEA), and two different intensity levels of
individualized educational need, the Court does not believe it appropriate (or
even possible) to identify set decision rules relative to a district’s
provision of FAPE.

_
_ _ _ _

5. The Court noted its “deference” to the expertise and judgement of the
professionals in a school district—albeit in a partnership with the
Parents—when writing an IEP, and it “vests these officials with responsibility
for decisions of critical importance to the life of a disabled child.”

_
_ _ _ _

6. Finally, the Court stated that IDEA’s provision of FAPE did not
include “an education that aims to pro­vide a child with a disability
opportunities to achieve academic success, attain self-sufficiency, and
contribute to society that are substantially equal to the opportunities
afforded children without disabilities.”

_
_ _ _ _

In Conclusion: As you “journey”
toward the end of this school year, I hope that this overview of the PASS
model, and its applications to the Supreme Court’s recently-clarified
perspective of FAPE, has provided you with a blueprint to help you to evaluate,
validate, and/or change your current district or school approaches to SWDs.

If I can help you in any area of the school
and schooling process, I am always happy to provide a free one-hour
consultation conference call to help you clarify your needs and directions on
behalf of your students.

Connecting with Howie

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About Me

Howard M. Knoff, Ph.D. is the creator and Director of Project ACHIEVE.After 22 years as a university professor and over 12 years as a federal grant director for a state department of education, he continues his national work as a full-time national consultant, author, and presenter.

Dr. Knoff is recognized nationwide as an expert in the following areas:

·School Improvement and
Turn-Around, Strategic Planning and Organizational Development

·Differentiated Academic
Instruction and Academic Interventions for Struggling Students

·Social, Emotional, and
Behavioral Instruction and Strategic and Intensive Interventions for Challenging
Students

·Multi-tiered (RtI)
Services, Supports, and Program

·Effective Professional
Development and On-Site Consultation and Technical Assistance

From 2003 through 2015, he was the Director of the federally-funded State Improvement Grant (SIG; 2003-2009) which then became the State Personnel Development Grant (SPDG; 2009-2015) for the Arkansas Department of Education (ADE). These grants funded the state-wide scale-up of Project ACHIEVE--especially its school improvement, positive behavioral support, and multi-tiered RtI service system components. Through the ADE's Elementary and Secondary Education Act flexibility process, Project ACHIEVE was the state's school improvement model for all Focus schools.

Prior to that, Dr. Knoff was a Professor of School Psychology at the University of South Florida (USF, Tampa, FL) for 18 years, and Director of its School Psychology Program for 12 years. He also was the creator and Director of the Institute for School Reform, Integrated Services, and Child Mental Health and Educational Policy at USF, and was instrumental in leading the program to the accreditation of its doctoral program by the American Psychological Association.

Project ACHIEVE is a nationally-recognized school
effectiveness/school improvement program that has been designated a National
Model Prevention Program by the U. S. Department of Health & Human
Service’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
(SAMHSA).Over the past 30 years, Howie
has implemented Project ACHIEVE components in thousands of schools or school
districts—training in every state in the country.He has also been awarded over $21 million in
federal, state, or foundation grants for this work, and recently received two
School Climate Transformation grants and one Elementary and Secondary
Counseling grant from the federal government to support work in Pennsylvania,
Michigan, and Kentucky.

Dr. Knoff received his Ph.D. degree from
Syracuse University in 1980, and has worked as a practitioner, consultant,
licensed private psychologist, and university professor since 1978.Dr. Knoff is widely respected for his
research and writing on school reform and organizational change, consultation
and intervention processes, social skills and behavior management training,
Response-to-Intervention, and professional issues.

He has authored or co-authored 18 books,
published over 100 articles and book chapters, and delivered over 1,000 papers
and workshops nationally—including the Stop & Think Social Skills
Program (preschool through middle school editions) and the Stop &
Think Parent Book:A Guide to Children’s
Good Behavior through Cambium Learning/Sopris West Publishers and Project
ACHIEVE Press, respectively.

Dr. Knoff has a long history of working
with schools, districts, and community and state agencies and
organizations.For example, he has consulted with a number of state departments of
education, the Department of Defense Dependents School District during Desert
Storm in 1991, and the Southern Poverty Law Center.He has also served as an expert witness in
federal court five times, in addition to working on many other state and local
cases—largely for legal advocacy firms who are representing special education
and other students in need.

Specific to
school safety issues, Dr. Knoff was on the writing team that helped produce Early
Warning, Timely Response:A Guide to
Safe Schools, the document commissioned by President Clinton that was sent
to every school in the country in the Fall of 1998; and he participated in a
review capacity on the follow-up document, Safeguarding our Children: An
Action Guide.

A recipient of the Lightner Witmer Award
from the American Psychological Association's School Psychology Division for
early career contributions in 1990, and over $21 million in external grants
during his career, Dr. Knoff is a Fellow
of the American Psychological Association (School Psychology Division), a Nationally
Certified School Psychologist, a Licensed Psychologist in Arkansas, and he has
been trained in both crisis intervention and mediation processes.Frequently
interviewed in all areas of the media, Dr. Knoff has been on the NBC Nightly
News, numerous television and radio talk shows, and he was highlighted on an
ABC News' 20/20 program on "Being Teased, Taunted, and
Bullied."

Finally, Dr. Knoff was the 21st President of the National Association of
School Psychologists which now represents more than 25,000 school psychologists
nationwide. He is constantly sought after for his expertise in a wide variety of school,
psychological, and other professional issues. You can e-mail him at: knoffprojectachieve@earthlink.net